


icarus

by janewestin



Series: cosmos [4]
Category: The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-15
Updated: 2019-11-15
Packaged: 2021-01-31 09:37:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21444106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janewestin/pseuds/janewestin
Summary: The morning after.(Gravity, chapter 11 - from Miranda's POV)
Relationships: Miranda Priestly/Andrea Sachs
Series: cosmos [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1541275
Comments: 31
Kudos: 247





	icarus

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nightwindsent](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightwindsent/gifts).

> This was originally going to be a prompt fill chapter for cosmic, but it felt a little longer and more complete, so I decided to post it as its own work.

She doesn’t mean to see who’s calling. If she hadn’t been so soundly asleep, she would have made an effort to look anywhere _ but _ the ringing phone. Although she had laid awake for a considerable part a of the night, thinking about her actions, she does not particularly relish a confirmation—in the form of a call from one of Andrea’s friends, or worse, her _parents_—of the cold reality that she has made a grievous mistake.

But she isn’t fully awake, and she looks. 

Andrea fumbles, her hurry to reject the call confirming the significance of the caller. Miranda feels an icy knot begin to form in the pit of her stomach. She pushes the covers back. Stands.

“Miranda!” Andrea’s voice behind her, growing louder as the distance between them widens. “Hey. Miranda!”

The knot in Miranda’s stomach tumbles as she ascends the stairs, proliferates. By the time she closes the door of her room, it feels as though her lungs are trying to expand against a snowdrift.

She locks the door. It’s childish and she knows it, but it’s becoming increasingly difficult to breathe.

_ Brooklyn Lauren _ . The same girl who had texted on the night of Nigel’s party. _ Hey babe, u awake? _

_ Babe _. Miranda became a mother at thirty-four. That doesn’t change the fact that Andrea is young enough to be her daughter.

“Miranda.” Andrea is outside the door. The knob rattles.

She finds her voice, barely. “Take something from Cassidy’s closet to wear home.”

“I am not,” Andrea says, her tone sharpening, “having this conversation through a door.”

Something flickers in her chest, tiny and warm, threatening the ice-block that Miranda’s entire torso has become. She goes to the door.

Andrea’s pixie cut is sticking straight up. There are sheet creases on her face, and she’s missing an earring. But her eyes are bright and focused, and her face is set with determination. 

“_ Thank _ you,” she says, brushing briskly past Miranda. Adds, “I don’t know what you’re thinking, but it’s not that.”

The little flame in her chest intensifies. “I’m not thinking anything,” she says flatly, going to the vanity. How unlike her, to lounge in bed on a weekday. How _ juvenile. _

“Oh yeah?” Andrea moves behind her, ducking this way and that in attempt to meet her gaze. Miranda looks at anything but those enormous, accusatory brown eyes. “Is that why you shot out of bed like I was a...a mountain troll, or something?”

Astonishment straightens Miranda’s spine, and for a moment she forgets to avert her eyes. “I did no such thing,” she snaps. 

Andrea scowls, disbelief evident on her face. “Okay.”

Miranda drops into the vanity chair. She cannot have a conversation like this looking like she does: bare-faced, unkempt, vulnerable. “I was allowing you some privacy to take your phone call.” It’s a simple enough explanation. 

Which Andrea completely rejects. “Oh, for Pete’s sake,” she says, and suddenly the brush is lifted from Miranda’s hand. For a moment, she is too surprised to speak, and then Andrea is _ there _ , wedging herself between the vanity and Miranda. “That was some girl on I went on _ three _ dates with over a _ month _ ago.”

_ Dates _. Andrea dates. Of course. She dates young, cute blondes with trendy haircuts and freckles. 

She snatches the brush back. “I fail to see how your love life is relevant.”

“_ Miranda _.” Andrea drops her head back in exasperation. “I ghosted her, okay?”

Miranda grits her teeth. “Again—” 

“I ghosted her because of _ you _,” Andrea snaps. 

The words die on Miranda’s tongue. She opens her mouth, but no words come out. 

“I have no idea why she’s calling me now,” Andrea continues, two spots of pink appearing in her cheeks. She actually looks _ angry _ . “Not that I should have to explain myself, but I will, because I care about you and I don’t want you to think that she means—that she means _ anything—” _

Miranda’s heart starts to hammer. _ I care about you. _The words float in the air, drifting like sweet perfume around Miranda’s head. She could breathe them in, if she chose to, but Andrea is still talking.

“And I just—” Andrea lifts both hands in a helpless little gesture. “I don’t want you to, I don’t know. Feel bad.” She stops.

Miranda sits very, very still. 

_ I care about you _.

She knows Andrea is waiting for a response. She knows, but she does not trust herself to speak. When Andrea nudges her shoulder, her throat is almost too tight to form words. 

She forces them out, propelled by the insistent thumping of her burning heart in its cage of ice. “The girl is irrelevant.”

Andrea looks at her blankly. “Excuse me?”

Miranda does not want to explain. She would prefer that Andrea think she is, in fact, only jealous. “You heard me,” she says.

Andrea rolls her eyes. “Yeah, I heard you, but I don’t _ understand _you. Can you elaborate, please, or do I need to get out my Miranda-to-English dictionary?”

Her offhandedness makes Miranda feel as though the world is tipping on its axis, as though the floor might give way at any time. “Did you ever think, Andrea,” she manages to say, gritting her teeth against the sudden vertigo, “that you were perhaps better suited to someone closer to your own age?”

She can’t bring herself to look up at Andrea. She is cracked open, flayed.

The pause is interminable, though, and when she finally lifts her gaze, she is horrified to see a _ smile _ on Andrea’s lips. 

“Something amusing?” she demands, her mortification momentarily eclipsed by fury at Andrea’s apparent delight. 

“Actually, yes,” Andrea says, and abruptly her hands are in Miranda’s hair. 

The rage clogging Miranda’s throat shrivels. Andrea’s expression is soft, even fond. “The amusing thing,” Andrea continues, her fingers gently tangling, “is that you think anyone, my own age or not, could in any way hold the tiniest, weensiest, little-bittiest candle to you.”

The flame in Miranda’s chest explodes into a blaze.

“Is that so,” she says, fighting to keep her tone even. 

Andrea’s hands tighten, tugging Miranda’s hair. Pulling Miranda’s head back. 

“Yeah,” she says huskily, “that’s so.” And then her lips are on Miranda’s throat. “That’s really, absolutely so.”

_ I care about you _. 

Miranda inhales. 

Andrea’s lips move down her throat and up again, teeth gently scraping, and Miranda burns. She burns so bright and hot that she has to do something, say something, for fear she might combust on the spot.

“Your point,” she manages to say, “has been received, but kindly do me a favor.”

She feels Andrea’s smile against her skin. “What’s that?” 

“Never—” and almost can’t finish her sentence, because Andrea’s tongue has swept the hollow of her collarbone, and how could she possibly _ know _ that this is the most sensitive spot on Miranda’s body? She clutches at Andrea, gasps. “—use the word _ weensiest _ again.”

Soft laughter, and she feels Andrea’s hands on the buttons of her pajama top. “I promise.”

She will be ashes. Andrea has chosen, and there will be no phoenixian rebirth. She must be certain.

It’s a flimsy line, but she says it anyway. “Don’t you have to—to get to the office?”

“Since when,” Andrea laughs against her shoulder, her hands still moving on the buttons, “are you worried about my work schedule?”

_ Engulfed. _

Miranda gives up.

She is molten in Andrea’s artful hands. Moves in ways she no longer thought she could. She closes her eyes and sees flames. “Just—” she hears herself say, and has no need to finish the sentence, because Andrea seems to know already what Miranda needs.

Andrea moves, and Miranda moves with her. Eyes closed, succumbed. Andrea’s hands are everywhere; her mouth leaves burning trails over Miranda’s skin. She hears herself saying Andrea’s name and barely recognizes her own voice. 

“Don’t,” she says, a bare whimper that she cannot help. “Don’t you dare stop.”

Andrea surges forward. Plies into the blazing core of her, and Miranda is lost.

It isn’t until she comes back to earth—to the feeling of Andrea’s mouth still moving on her oversensitive flesh—that she realizes the irrevocability of what she has done. She jerks away. 

“Sorry, sorry.” Andrea’s gasping laugh. She rests her forehead against Miranda’s thigh.

_ Sorry _. No. Andrea has nothing for which to be sorry. She means to pull back, to tell Andrea she has made a terrible, terrible mistake.

Instead, she finds herself reaching blindly forward. Stroking Andrea’s unruly hair. Running a thumb across her temple. Saying: “I think that your apology today is as unwarranted as you claimed mine was last night.”

When Andrea laughs, it warms Miranda’s entire body. 

She looks. 

Andrea’s head is tipped against her inner knee. Her eyes are sparkling, her smile like the sun. “You are,” she says, “absolutely _ cosmic _.”

_ I cannot love you _, Miranda thinks.

“Andrea,” she says, “I believe the feeling is mutual.”

***

**Author's Note:**

> ps I know I made up some words but I invoke Thor and say all words are made up.


End file.
